Bug Leaderboard exploit discussion

Background: I haven't been playing in a while, so I didn't notice until yesterday that FarSight seem to have cleaned up the leaderboards a bit, including getting rid of my bogus 300+ million high score for Genie. "Finally", I thought. "I wonder if they've fixed the most important thing - the bug that allowed me to (unintentionally) get that score in the first place".

Test: For the first time, I intentionally tried to exploit the bug, and guess what, it's still there, and I can take advantage of it at will. I gave myself nearly 2 million on Central Park. I didn't quite realize Central Park is such a low scoring game - in comparison my score is obviously fake and nobody will believe it, and it's probably gonna get deleted promptly by FarSight. For the ultimate test, I wanted to use the bug a second time, proving the first time wasn't a fluke, and this time give myself a more believable score. I knew the highest score for Genie was 4+ million, I took aim at that, and gave myself 4.3+ million. It wasn't enough for first place, but that's irrelevant, the point is I could do it, and the score looks totally legit.

Conclusion: I stumbled upon this bug at first, and I was shocked when I noticed how easy it was to recreate at will. Now, of all the thousands of people who've been playing Pinball Arcade, I can't possibly be the only one who is aware of this bug. No way. In fact, I'm surprised you can play the game for an extended period at all and not discover the bug. In my opinion, the leaderboard is totally pointless. Not a single score can be trusted. Who knows how many players who are taking advantage of this bug and have heads cool enough not to making it appear glaringly fake. That goes for all tables, including the Hall of Fame. I hope you guys are all playing just for the fun of it, and not only chasing high scores.

Disclosure: If my scores haven't been deleted by the end of this week, I will contact FarSight myself and request that they do get deleted, including 2000 points of my Hall of Fame score.

cmon share the bug already

I will not disclose how to exploit the bug, here or in a PM, so don't even bother asking.

I'm curious too, but I think that's the right decision you made there to not share the bug. As long as FarSight are aware that it exists (have you tested on multiple platforms, iOS, Mac, consoles?), the less people know about it the better. For the sake of keeping the leaderboards clean, if nothing else.

You should at least email FarSight ( support@farsightstudios.com ) and tell them how you did it, just in case they *don't* know how it's done.

I'm a little curious if this bug is Android-specific or not. All the really nutty scores I've seen have been "Mobile" ones, as far as I can recall.

Totally agree not sharing here - but you must email the issue to Farsight and also PM employees who are registered here. Bugs/exploits like this make a mockery of the game and should be stopped ASAP.

Now I dont know if I should trust my own scores

There are a couple of things that make me a bit cross though.

1. Obvious bogus scores are often referred to as "hacks" here on the forum. That annoys me. I'm not a hacker, I'm a victim (of a major software bug), at least the first time it happened to me. Sure, I got a high position on the leaderboard and 1000 points to my Hall of Fame score, but that to me is like someone spoiling the end of a movie.

2. I'm getting sick of sending bug reports to FarSight. Pinball Arcade is a very buggy game, and I don't see why I should be doing the job of a beta tester.

3. Even if the bug gets fixed now, the damage has already been done, at least potentially. I find it highly unlikely that I'm the only one who has discovered this bug, and that the leaderboard is already contaminated with bogus scores. Unless, FarSight has some one of detecting fraudulent scores, which judging from how long fake scores have been on the leaderboard in the past, they don't. A full reset would then be the only way to make sure it's clean.

However, I will still go ahead and report the bug to FarSight, and if/when it has been taken care of, I will explain how it worked, and you guys will see for yourself how ridiculously easy it was, and how unlikely it is that I'm the only one who found it.

I think the scores are usually referred to as hacks here because there are tools for iOS that can be used to "hack" and submit fake scores to thinks.

Thanks for reporting the bug to FarSight.

Gord Lacey said:

I think the scores are usually referred to as hacks here because there are tools for iOS that can be used to "hack" and submit fake scores to thinks.

Thanks for reporting the bug to FarSight.

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Likewise for Android. You can even get step by step youtube videos on how to use them on some games.

Not sure if it's a bug IN TPA that allows it (sounds like it if you can get millions in Central Park reported properly), but I can certainly think of a few ways to get a fake leaderboard score up.

There was a time (right near the release of the first four tables) where high scores would be posted with a few extra zeros at the end. Ended up giving me 20 billion instead of 200 million on Ripley's. That resulted in me being the number one spot for a few months =)

Edit: the leaderboard remains of little relevance to me, due to such flaws. I finally got the friends compare working, but that involved a reinstall, thus losing all my table and wizard goals, which I wasn't happy about.

Although I respect your decision, I don't see the point in not revealing the exploit you found. There's already videos of exploits and known glitches for almost every table. There are table specific threads here for the purpose of bringing these things to light and reporting them to FS.

For those curious, the glitch probably goes something like this: The ball gets stuck in an area where it hits a scoring target over and over. If you don't nudge, or nudge at the right time you can keep it there forever. Find that spot and you got it. Black Hole has a notorious one on top of the left slingshot.

DrainoBraino said:

For those curious, the glitch probably goes something like this: The ball gets stuck in an area where it hits a scoring target over and over. If you don't nudge, or nudge at the right time you can keep it there forever. Find that spot and you got it. Black Hole has a notorious one on top of the left slingshot.

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Actually what he said in his first post on this forum was

Luobo said:

My score is due to a bug that registers the score from the wrong table

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Hmmpf...Well, I was guessing. Still think he should make with the info.

DrainoBraino said:

Hmmpf...Well, I was guessing. Still think he should make with the info.

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Why? How many hours - or even minutes - would it take before the whole leaderboard became FUBAR if I revealed on a public forum how you can basically pick which table you want a certain score to register on? Yes, I'm not talking about some Mickey-Mouse-ball-getting-stuck-in-the-jet-bumpers glitch here.

I simply cannot believe I'm the only person in the world who has discovered this bug. There must be a whole bunch of people abusing this bug, but in a discrete way, and getting away with it.

I've e-mailed FarSight about it. Ball is in their court now.

When the bug has been fixed, I will tell you all about it, and trust me, it won't take a Youtube tutorial video to explain. You will not believe how easy it is.

Ok, well hopefully it gets fixed. Judging by the leaderboards, I think you very well may be one of the few that know this bug. I only see a couple of obvious glitch scores. Your Central Park score shows that you are definitely the only one who knows how to glitch that score.

Definitely do NOT post the glitch here.

DrainoBraino said:

Ok, well hopefully it gets fixed. Judging by the leaderboards, I think you very well may be one of the few that know this bug. I only see a couple of obvious glitch scores. Your Central Park score shows that you are definitely the only one who knows how to glitch that score.

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regardless of the method chosen there are probably 2 types of high score cheaters

i) those who post crazy unrealistic scores which obviously show they are hacks.
ii) those who post a score just a little higher than the previous best. These are more detrimental to our community as they cannot be detected unless FS close all the loop holes.